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Review: Streets of Rage 4 is a nostalgia punch for beat 'em up fans 1r63n

victor tiberius avatar
Gentlemen will love the game, but Streets of Rage 4 offers little more than a sense of nostalgia.

Nintendo Switch e PC. 24961

In this scenario, fans who can no longer hide their age cheered with an ad video that promised high doses of nostalgia, in addition to a modernized look. Indeed, Streets of Rage 4 it hits the emotional memory of longtime irers — and even entertains the younger audience —, however, it lacks gameplay innovation.

The Streets of Rage franchise 662ga

The Streets of Rage series was born in the 1990s (with three games released between 1991 and 1994) for video games from Sega (Mega Drive, Game Gear e Master System) and faced the franchise Final Fight, by Capcom, which was successful on the Super Nintendo.

Streets of Rage stood out for its visuals, considered advanced at the time, exciting soundtrack and fun gameplay. In the genre, the player controls a character who progresses sideways by punching bad guys. The story followed a group of police officers (controllable characters) who decided to take justice into their own hands and fought the crime syndicate in the fictional city of wood oak city.

In 2018, three producers — DotEmu, Lizardcube e Guard Crush Games — began development on a fourth title for the franchise, which would be released 26 years after the third game.

Visuals and track stand out 1n5d6z

The result of Streets of Rage 4 is a game that harks back to practically everything from its predecessors, as a true homage. Fortunately, the game also brings news, a mix that has a lot of potential to please old fans.

the visuals of Streets of Rage 4 they are not photorealistic or impressive in their complexity. The artistic style adopted for the game emphasizes that characters and scenarios were hand-drawn, and results in screens that are pleasant to look at.

Image that emphasizes artistic style.
The visuals are hand-drawn.

The lighting, which helps to compose the look, also stands out. During the stages, the player will through different sources of light, and all of them react to the protagonist's actions dynamically, with reflections on clothes and in puddles of water, for example.

The mixture of the simplicity of hand-drawn scenarios with the dynamism of the light effects generates a unique beauty to Streets of Rage 4. The artistic choice proved to be the right one, since, in this regard, it evolves the look of previous titles well, at the same time that it does not raise the cost of production to the levels of big brands in the electronic game industry.

Another factor that refers to the first three Streets of Rage is the soundtrack. In the fourth title, the songs have electronic touches and liven up the action on the screen. The tracks created for Streets of Rage 4 are very similar to the original tracks, but at the same time they have been modernized to sound good in 2020.

Both visually and soundly, Streets of Rage has customization elements for the most nostalgic players. It is possible to add filters so that the game runs as if it were running on a tube TV or a Mega Drive. The same for the soundtrack, which can play like in the 16-bit era.

technically perfect 63r4y

The developers' project Streets of Rage 4 may not be the size of blockbusters, but not because of that the work had been carried out with carelessness or sloppiness. On all platforms the game was released for (PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PCs with operating system Windows), the performance is impeccable.

Resolution is constant at 1080p (or 4K on PlayStation 4 Pro, Xbox One X and compatible computers), and performance, 60 frames per second, no stutter. Given the style of the game, which requires precise movements and quick thinking for combos, such framerate is very welcome.

Game running in multiplayer.
Even in multiplayer Streets of Rage 4 keeps the frame rate steady.

Streets of Rage 4 can be played by up to four players (on the same console), and in any number there is no drop in performance. For Nintendo Switch players, it is also possible to share the Joy-Cons for multiplayer gameplay.

Playing with multiplayer is the high point of Streets of Rage 4. With its high difficulty level, players need to master combo techniques to succeed. In multiplayer, the number of enemies in the stages is not changed, and it is possible for each controllable character to take advantage of another character's combo to increase the damage dealt to enemies. It's fun when the screen is full of enemies and the numbers of combos keep increasing.

Super damage combo.
It's nice when you get the hang of doing big combos.

However, there is a criticism: even though it is possible to play the entire campaign with any ed number of players, the game does not allow the addition or removal of characters at any time, forcing the restart (and consequent reload) of the phase.

In order to adapt to the new times, Streets of Rage 4 allows the campaign to be played online. Despite also running without stuttering (assuming there are no connection problems with any of the participants), only two people can play online simultaneously, which is a shame.

The nostalgia barrier 4h3q53

The history of Streets of Rage 4 it takes place ten years after the events of Streets of Rage 3. As with the previous games, there's no deep plot or complex ramifications, just an excuse to go around kicking ass at computer-controlled characters (so-called NPCs).

Old character reappears.
Streets of Rage 4 contains many references to previous games in the series.

This fact is not a negative point, on the contrary. The proposal of Streets of Rage 4 is to be a simple and straight to the point game, and that he does very well. However, nostalgia, another element to which the game clings, ends up serving as a limit to what could be a continuation of the franchise.

As the story unfolds, through character appearances (enemies or not) to gameplay, Streets of Rage 4 Reminds me of old franchise games. Although there is refinement in some points, such as the visuals and the good quality of the animations, the game does not go further and maintains the same gameplay structure as in the past.

Streets of Rage 4 it is a game with a high level of difficulty, and several ages will certainly have to be played multiple times to be successful. The problem is that the genre, by default, is repetitive, and the developers chose to keep movement locked (slow) and punitive to the less skilled.

Even long-time fans, who have many reasons to enjoy this work, suffer from the short duration of the game, which can be finished in less than four hours of play - half of that if you are a skilled player.

Well, with a taste of want more 3y702b

Streets of Rage 4 it would be a considerably more interesting game if, in addition to borrowing elements from the past, it had made its gameplay more dynamic, with faster movements, for example.

A new kind of scenario.
The scenarios are diverse, but the gameplay remains the same from start to finish.

It is a good game, with excellent technical refinement, with the potential to please the longing fans and delight younger players. On the other hand, it's only structured for the first group, and it still entertains for less than half a dozen hours — unless the player doesn't mind playing the same levels over and over again to try to beat their scores.

The game can be found for PC in the store Steam and also to Nintendo Switch na Nintendo eShop and also to PlayStation 4 na PlayStation Store, is for Xbox One na Microsoft Store.

PC version requirements 1z2573

Minima 47q6d

  • Operational system: Windows 7
  • Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 | AMD Phenom II X4 965
  • Memory: 4 GB of RAM
  • Video card: D Radeon HD 6670
  • Storage: 8 GB of available space

Recommended 3j1g3x

  • Operational system: Windows 7 or newer
  • Processor: Intel i5 +
  • Memory: 8 GB of RAM
  • Video card: NVIDIA GTX 960 | AMD Radeon HD 5750 or better
  • Storage: 10 GB of available space
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